DETROIT — A deal allowing the state to give some support to cash-strapped Detroit with limited oversight from Lansing is enabling Mayor Dave Bing to continue sweeping changes in the city while the work performed by emergency managers in other communities and public school districts have been stalled.

After the financial stability agreement was approved in April by Gov. Rick Snyder, Bing has imposed a new contract on some city workers, revealed a plan to upgrade Detroit's barely functioning street lighting operations and said 80 percent of Water and Sewerage workers might have to go to save hundreds of millions of dollars.

Bing expects his work to stand, despite the addition to the November general election ballot of a proposal asking Michigan voters to decide whether to keep a year-old law giving state-appointed emergency managers almost unlimited financial-fixing powers.

"It shouldn't" change what Detroit has done under the consent agreement, Bing said Friday.

"They had an emergency manager," Bing said of the four smaller cities and three school districts operating under Public Act 4. "We have a financial agreement. That's the difference. That's a big difference."

The group Stand Up for Democracy submitted more than 200,000 valid signatures to put the emergency manager law repeal question before voters.

Managers with scaled-back powers will remain in place under its predecessor, Public Act 72, through the Nov. 7 general election.

Some already have challenged work done under Public Act 4.

The Flint City Council is fighting the appointment of a new emergency manager, claiming the city's financial standing has improved and Flint no longer qualifies for a manager.

Detroit School Board members voted this week to cancel emergency manager Roy Roberts' decision to place 15 low-performing schools into a separate state district.

But nothing will be rescinded, Treasury Department spokesman Caleb Buhs said Friday.

"It doesn't undo any of the actions under Public Act 4," Buhs said. "Looking at the powers emergency managers had under PA4 and PA72, they are very similar. The modifying of contracts is not available to them at this point. I don't feel there is anything that is going to slow them down in the short term."

Authors of Detroit's financial stability agreement appear to have avoided similar problems by removing references to Public Act 4 from the final document.

A court has to "sort out" how all this fits under the agreement between Bing and Snyder, Detroit attorney Melvin "Butch" Hollowell said.

Hollowell was one of four lawyers representing Stand Up for Democracy.

"Clearly, the financial stability agreement was negotiated within the Public Act 4 context," Hollowell said. "There is no court that wouldn't understand that. You can't put illegal provisions in a contract and expect them to hold up."

The agreement lists "consolidation, disposition or elimination of city departments" under "reforms."

Annex D allows the city to impose new labor deals, while Annex E of the agreement calls for the creation of "a separate authority to manage and finance streetlights." Bing announced plans Friday for the creation of that authority.

It may be too late to reverse some of the changes already put in place under Detroit's deal with the state and work performed by emergency managers in Pontiac, Flint, Ecorse and Benton Harbor, and the Detroit, Highland Park and Muskegon Heights schools, Hollowell said.

"My sense is probably the actions going forward are under serious legal question," he said. "You can no longer impose your will by dictatorship."